


The Lost Children

by hiddenhibernian



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Horror, Sentient Hogwarts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-11
Updated: 2017-05-11
Packaged: 2018-10-16 02:33:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10561940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hiddenhibernian/pseuds/hiddenhibernian
Summary: Every student knows that Hogwarts has a mind of its own. They probably wouldn’t sleep at night if they knew what the castle really wants…





	

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my amazing beta Híril this story has been improved immensely – any remaining mistakes are my own. Thanks also to the lovely mod for hosting yet another great fest - thanks to the Dark Arts community I discovered the lure of the dark side, so I keep coming back for more. 
> 
> The story was written for the prompt: "'There's no point looking for the truth in here'. Would appreciate creepy rather than explicit. The creepier the better."
> 
> It was actually left for the Back To School fest in 2016, so I'm very late – better late than never, I hope...

The door was still open, as if someone had left in a rush. Inside the dormitory, Minerva was greeted by the familiar detritus left behind by students wherever they went, rather like slugs leaving tracks of slime.

A lonely sock. An open book – the fifth year Charms textbook, if she was not mistaken. A pile of damp Quidditch robes, discarded on the floor in a pile. That was useful – whatever had happened here, it had occurred before the house-elves had got time to clean up.

Minerva was probably the first living being setting a foot here since yesterday.

She glanced at her watch – it was past midnight. In magical terms that meant the start of a new day, although the dark windows bore no trace of dawn. For tired witches, it was still night. Minerva's hair was still holding up, reinforced as it was with charms and hairpins, and she kept her back straight as if the whole edifice would tumble down should she allowed herself to unbend just a fraction.

It had been a long evening, and the night promised worse.

Minerva had been annoyed when the Gryffindor prefect knocked on her door – she had only just finished her marking, and she had contemplated the possibility of having a dram of whisky before bed. She wouldn't, of course, but considering it had made her feel as if it were possible to carve out a bit of time for herself during term, in between lessons, planning and marking, and managing a herd of unruly Gryffindors.

"Professor," Mary Ferguson had said when Minerva opened the door, and it was obvious the girl already regretted coming to see her. Mary was a sensible girl (as much as any sixteen-year-old could be), rarely in two minds about anything other than whether to apply to join the Unspeakables or the Department of Magical Law enforcement.

Minerva had regretfully abandoned all hopes for a peaceful hour before bed. "Yes, Miss Ferguson?" she asked, taking care not to let her irritation seep through. "Is something the matter?"

"It's Rupe – Rupert Barrington, Professor. He says they're all gone." Mary frowned. "I don't think they – I mean, normally it would be Rupert, Bill and Shane getting up to something, if anything."

"Yes," Minerva agreed, passing the last six years under quick mental review. Rupert Barrington, William Weasley and Shane O'Sullivan had certainly been responsible for more than their fair share of rule-breaking, and they would generally stick to their own little group. "Who are 'all' of them?"

"Why, the other boys in his dorm: Bill, Shane, Vijay and Daniel. Rupert says they've been gone all evening. Bill was supposed to be at Quidditch practise, but he never showed up."

"Wait a moment, please." Minerva summoned her teaching robes – thanks Merlin she hadn't had time to change into her pyjamas – and grabbed her hat from its hook by the door. "Where is Mr Barrington now?" Minerva set a brisk pace towards Gryffindor Tower and Mary did her best to keep up.

"I told him to wait in the common room with Hector." The Rosier boy was the second Gryffindor prefect. It had been a bit of a risk to make him prefect, as he seemed to believe a Gryffindor should act first and think later, but Minerva had hoped Mary would have a sobering influence on him.

When they entered the Gryffindor common room, Minerva had the small satisfaction of seeing she had been right: Hector had wrapped a blanket around Rupert's shoulders and was speaking softly to him.

"Well done, both of you," she said. "Ten points to Gryffindor. Now, Mr Barrington, please tell me what has happened. All of it."

Rupert looked startled and she smiled inwards at the perpetual innocence of students; they never realised the teachers had been in their place once. In fact, on that very chair –

Now was not the time for reminiscences, however fond, and Minerva pushed the memories of her reprobate youth to the back of her mind. "In your own time, Mr Barrington."

"I haven't seen any of them all night. After Potions, I had to go down to the hospital wing to see Madam Pomfrey. I had pus coming out of my ears, it was really disgusting. You wouldn't believe the stench..." He seemed almost proud of his calamity.

Minerva remembered there had been an accident in Potions that day. Severus had been especially scathing on the subject of cack-handed students in the staffroom.

"I had to stay for a bit, so I missed dinner. It took Madam Pomfrey ages to get rid of all of it. When I came back, they weren't here. I thought they would turn up later, but they haven't. None of them, not even Vijay, and he always goes to bed at ten." Rupert clearly considered early bedtime fit only for first-years.

"Were any of them at dinner?" Minerva asked the two prefects, who nodded. "Did they come back here afterwards?" It had been a wet afternoon, with a thick mist wrapped around the castle – not very tempting for outdoor pursuits.

"I think so," Mary said slowly. "Vijay said something about a Potions essay –"

"It's due tomorrow," Rupert interrupted. "Snape was in a right mood – Professor Snape was rather annoyed in class," he corrected himself under Minerva's admonishing glare, although she tucked away the nugget to tease Severus with later. "Most of us in fifth year had to work on it after dinner."

"I saw Shane going upstairs just after dinner," Hector added. "I'm pretty sure Bill and Daniel were here too, but I wouldn't swear to it."

"And you haven't seen either of them since?" Minerva asked, and all three of them shook their heads. She wasn't very concerned yet, and Severus' essay was a possible explanation. While these four students were not the ones she would have picked out as likely to be absorbed in their homework, forgetting the time, stranger things had certainly happened at Hogwarts.

It occurred to her she had neglected the most logical explanation, but a quick Homenum Revelio failed to reveal any Disillusioned students lying in wait for Rupert. If it were a prank, they were hiding somewhere else.

"I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to wake up some of your housemates," she informed Mary and Hector. "Please find out if anyone has seen either of the boys, and if so, when and where. You can start with their friends. Please try not to wake up the younger ones if you can avoid it."

Minerva was under no illusion that most of the older students were probably still awake, hiding in their dormitories for her benefit. The clock had just struck eleven when she had put her marking aside, and judging by how hard it was to get them to pay attention in their first class of the day, her Gryffindors were a parliament of night owls.

While Hector and Mary scurried away to the dormitories, she turned around to an anxious-looking Rupert.

"Are you sure that's all you have to tell me, Mr Barrington?" She used the full force of her teacher glare on him, the one that made even Albus fidget. "Is there anything you would like to add?"

He squirmed, and then it all came bubbling out. "Shane said he'd found something, that he wanted to show us after dinner. Only I had to stay –"

"In the hospital wing, I know." Minerva interjected, not keen to hear more pus-filled details. "What did he find?"

"I don't know, only it was something really cool."

In Minerva's experience, the adjective (or any permutation thereof, depending on the fashionable vocabulary of the day) covered the gamut between the poster in the latest issue of Which Broomstick! and Dark artefacts.

"When did he find it?" she pressed. 'At the breakfast-table' would suggest something closer to the former than the worrying prospect of something Dark.

"Don't know." Rupert Barrington had not distinguished himself with his capabilities of independent reasoning, Minerva recalled from his essays ('Hair is harder to transfigure than eyebrows because it's bigger').

She tried to tease it out instead. "When did he tell you about it?"

"Not sure. I think it was yesterday."

"Where were you at the time?"

"Don't know, in class? Divination," he hastened to add. Fortunately, Sybill was probably having a nightcap up in the North Tower – no self-imposed abstinence for her – and didn't see Minerva's slight nod, to get Barrington to hurry along and forget the fact she was a teacher.

"He said we had to wait until tonight. It wouldn't work otherwise."

"It?" Minerva was running out of patience fast. Fortunately, Rupert was trying to visualise what had happened yesterday by screwing his eyes shut in the direction of the fireplace.

"It was something in our dorm, I think – he wanted to get rid of Vijay and Daniel. Only how he'd do that I don't know, Dan is always trying to find out what we're up to."

"Oh." Minerva wasn't sure whether to be relieved or disappointed – as the students patently were not in their dormitory now, her only clue seemed to be a red herring. Whatever 'cool' item Shane O'Sullivan had been talking about when he should have been studying tea leaves, it couldn't have anything to do with his disappearance.

She asked again, just to be sure: "And you can't remember anything else about it?"

"No, Professor."

Minerva sighed. There was nothing for it – she would have to wake up the others. Ten to one, Albus was conveniently away on Mugwump business; it was her hard-working fellow teachers she was concerned about. The last thing they needed was to be cast out from their comfortable rooms and dispatched into the chilly corridors to search for her errant students, but it had to be done.

At Muggle schools, she doubted the faculty regularly had to mount search parties for missing students.

At Muggle schools, the worst that could happen was illicit drug-taking behind the bike sheds. Minerva rather envied Muggle teachers sometimes. She still had to deal with the teenage hormones and the unstoppable drive to ingest banned substances, only with added magic.

"Mr Babbage?" The portrait woke up with a start, dropping his pink and purple turban in the process. "I beg your pardon for disturbing you, but I'm in urgent need of your help. Can you please inform the Heads of Houses their assistance is urgently needed in Gryffindor Tower?"

* * *

Filius was the first to suggest they ought to look inside the dormitory. A quick search of the most frequent haunts of miscreants had yielded nothing, and Severus and Pomona were busy laying the groundwork for a more extensive search. Severus' mouth was a thin line of disapproval; he was never one to condone the behaviour of Gryffindor rule-breakers.

"Why, do you think they're hiding under the bed?" Minerva snapped.

"No," Filius said mildly. "I've been reading Muggle books lately – there's only so much Gilderoy Lockhart a man can stand – and their Hit Wizards are very keen on what they call Clues."

"I know what a clue is, Filius – I was virtually raised on Sherlock Holmes."

Wise to her ways, he didn't push the matter, but he didn't look surprised when Minerva announced she was returning to Gryffindor Tower. Severus had roused Argus, who came equipped with encyclopaedic knowledge of the nooks and crannies of Hogwarts, and Mrs Norris. Few students could stay hidden from them for long, never mind four of them. When Argus returned empty-handed from his first round (he assured them he was going to do as many as it took, even if he had to keep going until dawn), Minerva decided she had better check in with her prefects.

If she happened to search the empty dormitory at the same time, that was her own affair.

Mary and Hector had surpassed her expectations; using a piece of parchment listing most of the older Gryffindors, they had drawn a complicated diagram they claimed showed all four boys had last been seen in the common room or heading up the stairs towards their dormitory. No one had seen any of them since about an hour after dinner.

"Well done," Minerva said briskly. "Twenty points to Gryffindor."

They looked pleased, but uneasiness soon took the upper hand again.

"We didn't try to – I mean, we've made sure no one has gone into their dorm," Mary said.

"Where's Mr Barrington?" Minerva suddenly wondered if she should have kept a closer eye on the boy, but she relaxed when Hector pointed to a snoring pile of assorted blankets on a transfigured bed next to the fire. "Very good. Please make yourselves comfortable – I may be a little while."

Hector curled up on the couch and Mary stirred the fire with a charm (her wand-work was getting better and better, Minerva noticed) as she briskly mounted the stairs to the boys' dormitories.

* * *

A thorough search unearthed no clues, obvious or otherwise. Sherlock Holmes himself would have been stumped. The great detective would of course not have had access to magic. Minerva did, but she still failed to detect any signs of the missing four.

Bearing in mind the amazingly fertile imaginations of teenage boys, she even checked the room for humans Transfigured into inanimate objects. Past students had certainly placed themselves in dafter situations than that.

It was no use – the boys were gone.

For the first time, Minerva wondered if she should send for Albus. None of the others had even suggested it, knowing his likely reaction. Students disappearing occasionally was a fact of life at Hogwarts. No doubt he would remind them the students usually turned up again, none the worse for their adventures.

While Minerva didn't hanker for a Headmaster wrapping the students in cotton wool like the Muggles did, she wished Albus would concern himself less with the inevitable rise of the next Dark Lord and more with the day-to-day realities of running a boarding school. Preferably with the objective of making it through the day with all students present and correct at the end, with the expected number of limbs. Healing charms were well and good, and wizards were very hard to kill, but Minerva preferred a minimum of physical trauma regardless.

The world outside school would knock some sense into them soon enough; Minerva didn't see the need to expose them to the cold realities of life on purpose before then. If one only paid attention, there were plenty of children facing problems beyond their tender years, long before they left Hogwarts.

Employing all the methods at her disposal, Minerva sighed and put her wand away. In the mirror on the wardrobe next to William Weasley's bed, she could see herself shrink, until her eyes had almost reached the floor. They changed shape as well, turning into little pinpoints of black surrounded by a vivid yellow, startlingly different to the staid brown of her human form.

The world looked different down here – paler and greyer, but with more layers than humans could dream of. She could hear students mumbling in the nearby dormitories, and occasional shouts from the search party outside.

Minerva yawned widely, bringing the scents lingering in the room into her mouth to dissect them. The smell of teenage boys was less tangible as a cat – human hormones meant nothing to them, so the odours clinging to unwashed clothes thrown around like confetti didn't offend her nose.

She had followed trails before, on Order business, but rarely in a confined living space where scent seemed to be layered upon scent in a mille-feuille of tracks. Hotspots like the pile of Quidditch clothing almost blinded her senses at first, but as she got used to following her nose, she learnt to tell the different scents apart.

The beds positively reeked of their usual occupants; Minerva jumped from one to the other, assigning a name to the scent before she moved on. Vijay's scent had a bitter twang, while Daniel's was cloyingly sweet (probably due to the Muggle deodorant he had smuggled in). Rupert smelled of dirt, cotton and parchment, more childlike than any of the others.

Once Minerva had them separated in her mind, she started sniffing in earnest, swinging her tail from side to side to focus.

There was something there – something fresh, without Rupert's notes of simple things, but with all the other scents mingled in the same place. It was a blank piece of wall between the bathroom and the entrance, halfway obscured when the door was left open – no doubt the reason why the inevitable posters with Quidditch and musicians had been fixed to the other walls instead.

It wasn't much, only bare stonework, and yet she was almost certain the four boys had congregated there. But why?

Maybe they had been desperate for the bathroom, she thought wryly – there was a reason all male teachers had voted unanimously to abolish the sinks inside the dormitories ten years ago. But surely they would just have nipped in next door?

She yawned again, stretching her mouth open so she was almost eating thin air in a last attempt to coax the truth out of the empty room before she changed back.

To human eyes, the wall was just as unremarkable. There was some graffiti – Sirius Black had been a busy boy a decade ago – but no clues. She even stroked the rugged stone with her paw, but it was the same uneven masonry one encountered in most of the castle.

The students had been standing together in front of the blank wall for some time. That was a clue in itself, but Minerva had no idea what to make of it. She didn't like being left in the dark at the best of times (an unfortunate trait in Albus' deputy), but it was deeply disquieting when her students had gone missing.

Perhaps the others had found something. She had better attend to Hector and Mary; they ought to be in their beds.

* * *

"Nothing?" Minerva asked Severus, who could have given any vampire a run for his money with his parchment-pale skin and deep, black eyes glowing in the torch-light. When others flagged, Severus kept going. Admittedly, he was the youngest, but Minerva rather thought he would have been searching with the same restless energy had he been a centenarian.

He didn't even rise to giving a sarcastic response to the somewhat redundant query, which was virtually unheard of.

"Nothing. Hagrid is talking to his friends," there was a definite sneer, "negotiating our entry into the Forest. Filius has Floo'd for assistance; we don't have the numbers for a thorough outside search."

"Did anyone wake Albus?" Minerva asked – if they were enlisting outsiders to help, this was hardly a minor matter anymore.

"Naturally. He has gone with Hagrid – " Severus started, but Minerva was destined never to find out if he was going to make a cutting comment or merely impart information, as a graceful creature she knew well landed in front of them.

"Kindly meet us at the edge of the Forbidden Forest – we have found them!" Albus' voice announced, and Minerva's knees suddenly gave out. She grabbed Severus arm, and despite her fingers digging into him hard enough to leave bruises, he mercifully didn't say anything.

He didn't let go of her arm, though, keeping a firm grip on it all the way down to the Forest.

* * *

Poppy tutted and clucked with disapproval, mending scratches and bruises as she went. Neither of the boys even noticed her presence, beyond submitting to her ministrations with worrying docility.

Minerva's mouth was curiously dry, and she had already squashed the impulse to sweep Daniel's fringe out of his eyes once. In class, he would toss his head incessantly, almost drawing a reprimand from her to tie his hair up if he couldn't abide it, but now the absence of the familiar gesture wrung her heart. All four boys had their gaze fixed somewhere in the distance, barely changing focus when they were half-pushed, half-lead into the brightly lit Infirmary from the cold night outside.

None of them had said a word since Hagrid found them beneath a tree just outside the Forbidden Forest.

It could have been worse, Minerva reminded herself. She might have been about to contact the parents to inform their their sons were still missing.

At least they were here, wherever their minds may be.

* * *

It turned out Albus had contacted the parents while Minerva was in the Infirmary. She found herself at a loss after steeling herself to do her duty, drifting without a clear idea of what to do next. Events intruded soon enough; Poppy called her to the Infirmary at the same time as a house-elf inquired about the arrangements for breakfast.

Minerva pulled herself together, charging the portrait of Dilys Derwent in the Headmaster's study with informing the students in Gryffindor Tower that the boys had been found.

"Yes, please proceed as usual," she told the house-elf waiting patiently at her knee. "Albus, please excuse me – I had better see what Poppy wants."

He waved her on as she tripped down the stairs at speed, hoping against hope her students had woken up from their strange haze.

* * *

"I don't know what to do with them," Poppy sighed, dangling the golden pendant she usually wore around her neck in front of Vijay. His eyes were focused on the cabinet holding first aid supplies in the corner rather than the ornament, and he seemed oblivious to their presence.

Minerva stretched her hand out to wipe away a drop of drool running down his chin. She was suddenly finding it hard to breathe. "His parents will be here in a few hours, Poppy. I have no idea what to tell them."

"Perhaps I can be of assistance – may I sit down?" Albus must have followed her down shortly after she had sprinted away. There was no twinkle in his eyes now, only the grave concern Minerva remembered from the worst times of her long life.

"Of course, Headmaster." Poppy moved out of the way, quickly checking on the other three charges before she returned to stand next to Minerva, placing her hand on Minerva's shoulder. She squeezed it in what was no doubt meant to be a reassuring gesture, but rather felt like the grasp of one about to drown.

Well, that made two of them. Maybe Albus could pull them out of the troubled waters; Minerva could not see her way back to the surface.

Give her Dark Wizards to fight any day; the Dark Arts may be subtle and ever-changing, as Severus was wont to wax sometimes, but as long as Minerva knew her enemy, she could find a way to bring them down. Healing had never been her forte; Healing of the mind was notoriously difficult, even for the most accomplished witches and wizards, amongst whom Poppy certainly counted, for all the time she spent soothing minor aches and bruises.

Albus bent down until his head was level with Vijay's, staring into the boy's eyes. He remained there, immobile, for what seemed a very long time for a man far past the prime of his life, until he emerged at last with a small sigh.

"All shall be well, I trust. Poppy, please send a message to the Ministry – we will require the services of their Obliviators shortly. Minerva, may I entrust you with holding off the parents until the Obliviators have completed their business? I am sure they will be vastly happier if their sons are their normal selves when they see them."

Minerva and Poppy stared at him. Where a lesser man may have relented, Albus Dumbledore held firm. He simply waited them out.

"Very well. I shall do my best." Minerva knew a lost cause when she saw it, and she refused to ask questions when it was obvious they would be flitted away like a particularly obnoxious fly.

"I'll Floo the Ministry at once." Poppy rose, casting a glance around the ward to confirm there had been no sudden change in her patients' state.

"I shall remain here,"Albus announced to nobody's surprise.

* * *

Having embraced a weary Molly Weasley ("If it's not one, it's the other – I've barely caught my breath since George broke his arm last week. Whatever will they do next?"), Minerva saw her Floo back home with relief. What business had she to alarm the poor woman further, now that all was well?

Besides, the only person who knew what had happened in the Forbidden Forest was Albus, and he was not telling.

Minerva frowned, remembering the concentrations of scent by the wall in the Gryffindor dormitory. She would bet her whiskers the story had started there – otherwise, why would they all have gone off to the Forbidden Forest in the first place? It didn't add up.

Having seen Shane and Daniel doing their utmost to talk Poppy into giving them dessert ("We need to build our strength up, Madam Pomfrey!"), with William and Vijay playing a game of Exploding Snap behind the inadequately charmed curtains where they were supposed to be resting, Minerva decided not to pursue the matter.

All's well that ends well; one ought to treasure the rare moments in life when they occur, rather than pick holes in them. Besides, Albus was as stubborn as an old goat, so there was no point wasting her time looking for answers that weren't forthcoming.

* * *

It wasn't until she finally had time to go through the Headmasters' – Headmistress', now – files a full year after Hogwarts had reopened that Minerva found out the truth.

Searching for the annals of the fire in 1774 – extensive repair work of the enchanted ceiling in the Great Hall had been required afterwards, and she was hoping someone had thought to keep a record of the spells used – Minerva pulled out a slim manila folder that looked considerably more recent than the fraying parchments surrounding it.

Seeing the familiar squiggles of Albus' execrable handwriting, her heart beat a little faster. Most of the reminders of him had been cleared away by Severus. When Minerva finally understood why, her heart broke for the poor boy, who had had so little in life to call his own.

Then, fury had taken her by surprise.

How dared he do it all on his own, like he didn't have a friend in the world other than Albus Dumbledore? Did he not think Minerva McGonagall could keep a secret? Merlin preserve the wizarding world from men (and boys) who believed they should carry it on their own shoulders.

She had come to an understanding with Severus, even though it was only in her own mind, but seeing Albus' scribbled message to his successors reminded her that a year was far too short a time in which to come to terms with the legacy he had left behind.

_It is with great sadness I find myself obliged to add to the testimony of the far greater minds that have preceded me. This time, four students were recovered at the very last moment, as unfortunately I was not summoned until they had been missing for several hours. I trust no permanent harm will have come to the boys, but it was with the greatest difficulty I compelled the castle to return them. As Madam Derwent correctly hypothesised before, based on the limited evidence available at the time, the length of time is a determining factor. The longer Hogwarts is allowed to persist in the belief it has succeeded in its aim to secure bodies and souls for its own purposes, the harder the task becomes to ensure the would-be victims are released._

_In this case, the students had found an enchanted object which directed them to a passage opening directly in their dormitory, from which they proceeded deep into what I sincerely hope is the purely metaphorical belly of the castle._

_To deflect suspicion, I ensured the students were found near the Forbidden Forest. I trust I have subdued the castle sufficiently to ensure its good conduct for several decades; at which time you, my dear successor, will surely have devised a much more efficient plan to ensure the continued safety of the young minds entrusted to our care._

_It is unfortunate that the castle should have acquired such powers of agency while being determined to use them for its own ends, rather than the good of the school. One can only surmise that continued exposure to magic over the centuries, coupled with access to the untrained minds of adolescents, has formed Hogwarts into not just a sentient being, but a sometimes malevolent one._

Minerva felt the draft from the fireplace caress her neck, and shivered. She felt exposed, like she never had at Hogwarts before, not even during their Annus Horribilis last year.

That the castle itself could wish ill upon the students chilled her to the bone.

She wondered if Hogwarts had left its mark upon them, despite Dumbledore's hope to the contrary; Bill Weasley had been drawn to a career as a Curse-Breaker, fighting malicious magic long before Voldemort had returned from the dead. Rupert Barrington had been killed during the war, but as a Muggle-born, it was perhaps not surprising he had been at the frontline. She wondered what had become of the others.

As if directed by an invisible force, Minerva's hand returned to the bookshelf, pulling out the notes left by the previous Headmaster, Armando Dippet. She had been a student during his tenure, but she could not recall any unexplained disappearances.

That didn't mean there hadn't been any; her teachers had presumably been quite as adept as her own colleagues at keeping information from the students when necessary.

_I was much saddened to find the legends about the school were not untrue; I have this very evening used every last ounce of magical knowledge I possess to compel it to return a student. I trust she will fare better in the morning, although I fear Hogwarts has left an indelible mark on her. I am not unfamiliar with the signs, having encountered them previously in our formidable Gamekeeper, Ogg. Nevertheless, I hope and pray young Miss McGonagall will make a full recovery._

The Hogwarts Express could have driven through her office at full speed, and Minerva would not have noticed.

She remembered Ogg; while no intellectual, he had possessed a canny sense of politics and had happily tended to his hut through the tenure of several Headmasters. His only weakness had been an absurd fear of being compelled to leave the castle; indeed, when he had at last retired, he had moved into a cottage as near as possible to Hogwarts. If Minerva wasn't mistaken, he had died within a fortnight of his retirement party.

Was she the same? Was this the reason Headmaster Dippet had welcomed her back to teach only a few short years after graduating? Minerva had been so pleased at the time, achieving her life's ambition at the tender age of twenty-one.

Her whole history seemed to belong to a stranger; the certainties of many decades shifting under her feet.

"Dinnae be a fool," she said out loud in her teacher voice, and the room stopped spinning.

What was done was done. Whatever complicated reasons had made her Headmistress of Hogwarts, that was what she was, and she had a job to do.

Returning to the here and now, she put the notes aside and continued to search for the annals of 1774. The more complicated task of figuring out exactly how to take on Hogwarts would have to wait.

* * *

When the call came, Minerva thought she was ready. "You can't have them," she told the castle, as if it would actually listen to her. "You may have the Thestrals and the creatures of the Forbidden Forest, and Lord knows you'll have most of us teachers before the end, but you cannae have the children."

The whole tower creaked and whimpered in protest as she set her plans in motion, but Minerva did not relent. Her heart was pounding so loud in her ears she could barely hear anything else, and her wand arm was shaking violently.

She may as well have tried to whistle down the wind, for all the notice the castle took of her efforts to bend it to her will.

Minerva had never found it hard to admit Albus was a more powerful wizard than she, but it rankled that Armando Dippet also had bested her. She simply could not make it work – her spells slid off the slippery tiles of the towers, and failed to penetrate the thick stone walls. Sheer stubbornness made her continue the assault, but she knew her strength already was failing.

Sometimes, magic could be very simple. The answer occurred to her straight out of the oldest stories, and Minerva barely considered the implications before making a last-ditch attempt to make the castle give up its prize.

It succeeded: a dishevelled bundle of dirty clothes and bushy red hair tumbled out of her fireplace.

"I only wanted to see the pretty fountain," Hugo Weasley sobbed, and Minerva swept him up in her arms, rocking him from side to side like she would a much younger child.

"It's all right," she whispered, as much as for her own benefit as to comfort him. "It's all right, it will be well. It's all right."

Hugo shook and shuddered as if he were in the grips of an invisible storm, but Minerva held her godson close until he calmed down.

Her chin was touching his head, so there was no way Hugo could see the colour of her eyes. There was no trace of their usual brown – hints of mossy green and almost-black slate were quickly overtaken by a stony grey, devoid of any warmth.

It had been a fair bargain: a soul for a soul.

A bairn for a hag, to make no bones about it, but perhaps Hogwarts regarded them all as children in any case. It was too late for regrets; Minerva only allowed herself a fleeting wish it would have ended differently as she slipped away, fading as the weight of the castle settled above her consciousness.

The being that remained in the headmistress' office disengaged herself from the child.

"I believe it is time to make some changes around here," she announced crisply, already hunting for a quill. Headmaster after headmistress had wasted their energy considering what was best for the students – it was time to consider what the castle itself needed. Hogwarts was finally in control of its own affairs in the world of witches and wizards; giving up one tiny boy was a small price to pay.


End file.
